[1921] in peace2
Fwd: [ppn] Fwd: [IAC] Ramsey Clark Letter to UN: Do Not
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Rebecca Lehman)
Sun Sep 22 21:30:10 2002
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Date: Sun, 22 Sep 2002 21:29:27 -0400
To: peace-announce@mit.edu
From: Rebecca Lehman <rclehman@MIT.EDU>
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>From: sureshpaul@aol.com
>Subject: [ppn] Fwd: [IAC] Ramsey Clark Letter to UN: Do Not Support Attack
>on Iraq
>Date: Sat, 21 Sep 2002 12:31:29 EDT
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>The following letter by former U.S. Attorney General
>Ramsey Clark has been sent to all members of the UN
>Security Council, with copies to the UN General Assembly.
>Please circulate.
>
>September 20, 2002
>
>Secretary General Kofi Annan
>United Nations New York, NY
>
>Dear Secretary General Annan,
>
>George Bush will invade Iraq unless restrained by the
>United Nations. Other international organizations--
>including the European Union, the African Union, the OAS,
>the Arab League, stalwart nations courageous enough to
>speak out against superpower aggression, international
>peace movements, political leadership, and public opinion
>within the United States--must do their part for peace. If
>the United Nations, above all, fails to oppose a U.S.
>invasion of Iraq, it will forfeit its honor, integrity and
>raison d?etre.
>
>A military attack on Iraq is obviously criminal;
>completely inconsistent with urgent needs of the Peoples
>of the United Nations; unjustifiable on any legal or moral
>ground; irrational in light of the known facts; out of
>proportion to other existing threats of war and violence;
>and a dangerous adventure risking continuing conflict
>throughout the region and far beyond for years to come.
>The most careful analysis must be made as to why the world
>is subjected to such threats of violence by its only
>superpower, which could so safely and importantly lead us
>on the road to peace, and how the UN can avoid the human
>tragedy of yet another major assault on Iraq and the
>powerful stimulus for retaliatory terrorism it would
>create.
>
>1. President George Bush Came to Office Determined to
>Attack Iraq and Change its Government.
>
>George Bush is moving apace to make his war unstoppable
>and soon. Having stated last Friday that he did not
>believe Iraq would accept UN inspectors, he responded to
>Iraq?s prompt, unconditional acceptance by calling any
>reliance on it a ?false hope? and promising to attack Iraq
>alone if the UN does not act. He is obsessed with the
>desire to wage war against Iraq and install his surrogates
>to govern Iraq by force. Days after the most bellicose
>address ever made before the United Nations--an
>unprecedented assault on the Charter of the United
>Nations, the rule of law and the quest for peace--the U.S.
>announced it was changing its stated targets in Iraq over
>the past eleven years, from retaliation for threats and
>attacks on U.S. aircraft which were illegally invading
>Iraq?s airspace on a daily basis. How serious could those
>threats and attacks have been if no U.S. aircraft was ever
>hit? Yet hundreds of people were killed in Iraq by U.S.
>rockets and bombs, and not just in the so called ?no fly
>zone,? but in Baghdad itself. Now the U.S. proclaims its
>intentions to destroy major military facilities in Iraq in
>preparation for its invasion, a clear promise of
>aggression now. Every day there are threats and more
>propaganda is unleashed to overcome resistance to George
>Bush?s rush to war. The acceleration will continue until
>the tanks roll, unless nonviolent persuasion prevails.
>
>2. George Bush Is Leading the United States and Taking the
>UN and All Nations Toward a Lawless World of Endless Wars.
>
>
>George Bush in his ?War on Terrorism? has asserted his
>right to attack any country, organization, or people
>first, without warning in his sole discretion. He and
>members of his administration have proclaimed the old
>restraints that law sought to impose on aggression by
>governments and repression of their people, no longer
>consistent with national security. Terrorism is such a
>danger, they say, that necessity compels the U.S. to
>strike first to destroy the potential for terrorist acts
>from abroad and to make arbitrary arrests, detentions,
>interrogations, controls and treatment of people abroad
>and within the U.S. Law has become the enemy of public
>safety. ?Necessity is the argument of tyrants.? ?Necessity
>never makes a good bargain.?
>
>Heinrich Himmler, who instructed the Nazi Gestapo ?Shoot
>first, ask questions later, and I will protect you,? is
>vindicated by George Bush. Like the Germany described by
>Jorge Luis Borges in Deutsches Requiem, George Bush has
>now ?proffered (the world) violence and faith in the
>sword,? as Nazi Germany did. And as Borges wrote, it did
>not matter to faith in the sword that Germany was
>defeated. ?What matters is that violence ... now rules.?
>Two generations of Germans have rejected that faith. Their
>perseverance in the pursuit of peace will earn the respect
>of succeeding generations everywhere.
>
>The Peoples of the United Nations are threatened with the
>end of international law and protection for human rights
>by George Bush?s war on terrorism and determination to
>invade Iraq.
>
>Since George Bush proclaimed his ?war on terrorism,? other
>countries have claimed the right to strike first. India
>and Pakistan brought the earth and their own people closer
>to nuclear conflict than at any time since October 1962 as
>a direct consequence of claims by the U.S. of the
>unrestricted right to pursue and kill terrorists, or
>attack nations protecting them, based on a unilateral
>decision without consulting the United Nations, a trial,
>or revealing any clear factual basis for claiming its
>targets are terrorists and confined to them.
>
>There is already a near epidemic of nations proclaiming
>the right to attack other nations or intensify violations
>of human rights of their own people on the basis of George
>Bush?s assertions of power in the war against terrorism.
>Mary Robinson, in her quietly courageous statements as her
>term as UN High Commissioner for Human Rights ended, has
>spoken of the ?ripple effect? U.S. claims of right to
>strike first and suspend fundamental human rights
>protection is having.
>
>On September 11, 2002, Colombia, whose new administration
>is strongly supported by the U.S., ?claimed new authority
>to arrest suspects without warrants and declare zones
>under military control,? including ?[N]ew powers, which
>also make it easier to wiretap phones and limit
>foreigners? access to conflict zones... allow security
>agents to enter your house or office without a warrant at
>any time of day because they think you?re suspicious.?
>These additional threats to human rights follow
>Post-September 11 ?emergency? plans to set up a network of
>a million informants in a nation of forty million. See,
>New York Times, September 12, 2002, p. A7.
>
> 3. The United States, Not Iraq, Is the Greatest Single
>Threat to the Independence and Purpose of the United
>Nations.
>
> President Bush?s claim that Iraq is a threat justifying
>war is false. Eighty percent of Iraq?s military capacity
>was destroyed in 1991 according to the Pentagon. Ninety
>percent of materials and equipment required to manufacture
>weapons of mass destruction was destroyed by UN inspectors
>during more than eight years of inspections. Iraq was
>powerful, compared to most of its neighbors, in 1990.
>Today it is weak. One infant out of four born live in Iraq
>weighs less than 2 kilos, promising short lives, illness
>and impaired development. In 1989, fewer than one in
>twenty infants born live weighed less than two kilos. Any
>threat to peace Iraq might become is remote, far less than
>that of many other nations and groups and cannot justify a
>violent assault. An attack on Iraq will make attacks in
>retaliation against the U.S. and governments which support
>its actions far more probable for years to come.
>
>George Bush proclaims Iraq a threat to the authority of
>the United Nations while U.S.-coerced UN sanctions
>continue to cause the death rate of the Iraqi people to
>increase. Deaths caused by sanctions have been at
>genocidal levels for twelve years. Iraq can only plead
>helplessly for an end to this crime against its people.
>The UN role in the sanctions against Iraq compromise and
>stain the UN?s integrity and honor. This makes it all the
>more important for the UN now to resist this war.
>
>Inspections were used as an excuse to continue sanctions
>for eight years while thousands of Iraqi children and
>elderly died each month. Iraq is the victim of criminal
>sanctions that should have been lifted in 1991. For every
>person killed by terrorist acts in the U.S. on 9/11, five
>hundred people have died in Iraq from sanctions.
>
>It is the U.S. that threatens not merely the authority of
>the United Nations, but its independence, integrity and
>hope for effectiveness. The U.S. pays UN dues if, when and
>in the amount it chooses. It coerces votes of members. It
>coerces choices of personnel on the Secretariat. It
>rejoined UNESCO to gain temporary favor after 18 years of
>opposition to its very purposes. It places spies in UN
>inspection teams.
>
>The U.S. has renounced treaties controlling nuclear
>weapons and their proliferation, voted against the
>protocol enabling enforcement of the Biological Weapons
>Convention, rejected the treaty banning land mines,
>endeavored to prevent its creation and since to cripple
>the International Criminal Court, and frustrated the
>Convention on the Child and the prohibition against using
>children in war. The U.S. has opposed virtually every
>other international effort to control and limit war,
>protect the environment, reduce poverty and protect
>health.
>
>George Bush cites two invasions of other countries by Iraq
>during the last 22 years. He ignores the many scores of
>U.S. invasions and assaults on other countries in Africa,
>Asia, and the Americas during the last 220 years, and the
>permanent seizure of lands from Native Americans and other
>nations--lands like Florida, Texas, Arizona, New Mexico,
>California, and Puerto Rico, among others, seized by force
>and threat.
>
>In the same last 22 years the U.S. has invaded, or
>assaulted Grenada, Nicaragua, Libya, Panama, Haiti,
>Somalia, Sudan, Iraq, Yugoslavia, Afghanistan and others
>directly, while supporting assaults and invasions
>elsewhere in Europe, Asia, Africa, and the Americas.
>
>It is healthy to remember that the U.S. invaded and
>occupied little Grenada in 1983 after a year of threats,
>killing hundreds of civilians and destroying its small
>mental hospital, where many patients died. In a surprise
>attack on the sleeping and defenseless cities of Tripoli
>and Benghazi in April 1986, the U.S. killed hundreds of
>civilians and damaged four foreign embassies. It launched
>21 Tomahawk cruise missiles against the El Shifa
>pharmaceutical plant in Khartoum in August 1998,
>destroying the source of half the medicines available to
>the people of Sudan. For years it has armed forces in
>Uganda and southern Sudan fighting the government of
>Sudan. The U.S. has bombed Iraq on hundreds of occasions
>since the Gulf War, including this week, killing hundreds
>of people without a casualty or damage to an attacking
>plane.
>
>4. Why Has George Bush Decided The U.S. Must Attack Iraq
>Now?
>
> There is no rational basis to believe Iraq is a threat
>to the United States, or any other country. The reason to
>attack Iraq must be found elsewhere.
>
>As governor of Texas, George Bush presided over scores of
>executions, more than any governor in the United States
>since the death penalty was reinstated in 1976 (after a
>hiatus from 1967). He revealed the same zeal he has shown
>for ?regime change? for Iraq when he oversaw the
>executions of minors, women, retarded persons and aliens
>whose rights under the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic
>Relations of notification of their arrest to a foreign
>mission of their nationality were violated. The Supreme
>Court of the U.S. held that executions of a mentally
>retarded person constitute cruel and unusual punishment in
>violation of the U.S. Constitution. George Bush addresses
>the United Nations with these same values and willfulness.
>
>His motives may include to save a failing Presidency which
>has converted a healthy economy and treasury surplus into
>multi-trillion dollar losses; to fulfill the dream, which
>will become a nightmare, of a new world order to serve
>special interests in the U.S.; to settle a family grudge
>against Iraq; to weaken the Arab nation, one people at a
>time; to strike a Muslim nation to weaken Islam; to
>protect Israel, or make its position more dominant in the
>region; to secure control of Iraq?s oil to enrich U.S.
>interests, further dominate oil in the region and control
>oil prices. Aggression against Iraq for any of these
>purposes is criminal and a violation of a great many
>international conventions and laws including the General
>Assembly Resolution on the Definition of Aggression of
>December 14, 1974.
>
>Prior regime changes by the U.S. brought to power among a
>long list of tyrants, such leaders as the Shah of Iran,
>Mobutu in the Congo, Pinochet in Chile, all replacing
>democratically elected heads of government. 5. A Rational
>Policy Intended to Reduce the Threat of Weapons of Mass
>Destruction in The Middle East Must Include Israel.
>
> A UN or U.S. policy of selecting enemies of the U.S. for
>attack is criminal and can only heighten hatred, division,
>terrorism and lead to war. The U.S. gives
>Israel far more aid per capita than the total per capita
>income of sub Sahara Africans from all sources.
>U.S.-coerced sanctions have reduced per capita income for
>the people of Iraq by 75% since 1989. Per capita income in
>Israel over the past decade has been approximately 12
>times the per capita income of Palestinians.
>
>Israel increased its decades-long attacks on the
>Palestinian people, using George Bush?s proclamation of
>war on terrorism as an excuse, to indiscriminately destroy
>cities and towns in the West Bank and Gaza and seize more
>land in violation of international law and repeated
>Security Council and General Assembly resolutions.
>
>Israel has a stockpile of hundreds of nuclear warheads
>derived from the United States, sophisticated rockets
>capable of accurate delivery at distances of several
>thousand kilometers, and contracts with the U.S. for joint
>development of more sophisticated rocketry and other arms
>with the U.S.
>
>Possession of weapons of mass destruction by a single
>nation in a region with a history of hostility promotes a
>race for proliferation and war. The UN must act to reduce
>and eliminate all weapons of mass destruction, not submit
>to demands to punish areas of evil and enemies of the
>superpower that possesses the majority of all such weapons
>and capacity for their delivery.
>
>Israel has violated and ignored more UN Resolutions for
>forty years than any other nation. It has done so with
>impunity.
>
>The violation of Security Council resolutions cannot be
>the basis for a UN-approved assault on any nation, or
>people, in a time of peace, or the absence of a threat of
>imminent attack, but comparable efforts to enforce
>Security Council resolutions must be made against all
>nations who violate them.
>
> 6. The Choice Is War Or Peace.
>
>The UN and the U.S. must seek peace, not war. An attack on
>Iraq may open a Pandora?s box that will condemn the world
>to decades of spreading violence. Peace is not only
>possible; it is essential, considering the heights to
>which science and technology have raised the human art of
>planetary and self-destruction.
>
>If George Bush is permitted to attack Iraq with or without
>the approval of the UN, he will become Public Enemy Number
>One--and the UN itself worse than useless, an accomplice
>in the wars it was created to end. The Peoples of the
>World then will have to find some way to begin again if
>they hope to end the scourge of war.
>
>This is a defining moment for the United Nations. Will it
>stand strong, independent and true to its Charter,
>international law and the reasons for its being, or will
>it submit to the coercion of a superpower leading us
>toward a lawless world and condone war against the cradle
>of civilization?
>
>Do not let this happen.
>
>Sincerely,
>
>Ramsey Clark
>
>
>
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>
>
>
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